Detention
by marziipan
Summary: McGonagall doles out detentions. Lily can take any punishment as long as it distracts her from her unruly feelings for a certain sixth-year rule-breaker. Kinda-sorta in the "Month of Sundays" universe, but feel free to imagine otherwise. (Mostly) fluffy one-shot.


Lily Evans was in detention. Though it was not the first time, she had certainly not made a habit of it like some of her classmates had, and there was a distinct awkwardness between Professor McGonagall and herself.

"You can start with the Second Years,' as I meet with them first thing tomorrow," the professor said curtly, passing Lily a stack of Transfiguration exams to mark. "The rubric and answer key are there," she pointed. "And when you've finished those, you can start on the First Years' exams."

"Yes, Professor," Lily replied cheerily, wishing to break some of the tension in her Head of House's office. She suspected, of course, that the awkwardness was due in part to the fact that Professor McGonagall would have preferred not to have given the detention at all...

For the third time that week, Bruce Morton had cast the _Ventus Jinx_ at Wendy Branson's skirt—Wendy had developed considerably over the summer, and she could scarcely walk through the halls without attracting stares and whispers from half the school—and Lily had had enough. Morton, the sort of bloke who gave unsolicited shoulder massages and regarded the gay girls in school as simply in need of a good shagging from him, had taken to sneaking his wand out of his sleeve in the hallways in hopes that a well-aimed _Ventus Jinx_ would catch a girl's skirt just right, giving him a clear view of her knickers. Perhaps even more infuriatingly, he would then take to appraising the undergarments he had no right to glimpse in the first place, making the girls flush even deeper shades of scarlet as he laughed at their granny knickers or licked his lips at scanty lace.

Lily realized that she ought to have handled the situation with the sort of civil equanimity that became Senior Prefects and young women who were nearly of-age: scolding Morton discreetly, perhaps, while quietly reassuring Wendy that the issue would be dealt with immediately, and finally reporting the incident to Professor McGonagall, possibly offering recommendations for the disciplinary action that ought to be taken.

What Lily did, however, was punch Bruce Morton in the face. A lot.

It had seemed like only seconds before she was being pried off of him in the center of an enormous, screeching crowd, someone's voice in her ear—"Lily! LILY! Stop, calm DOWN, he...isn't...worth this!"— but it was long enough to have shattered her hand, which was quickly cradled by the same boy who'd pulled her away from the scuffle. "Lily, NO! Stop," said Remus breathlessly, catching her around the waist as she tried to lunge forward again, shouting Merlin-knows-what over his shoulder. A few of the crowd had surrounded Bruce now, half helping him to his feet, half restraining him as he shouted equally foul obscenities back at Lily. Of course, Professor McGonagall arrived on the scene like a strike of lightning, sending most of the crowd scattering off to class and bringing Lily to her senses.

She knew that students had lost their Prefectships for much less, and Professor McGonagall was already at her wit's end over another brawl that had broken out the previous day. James Potter and Sirius Black had lunged at one of the Slytherin Prefects after he called Remus Lupin "Drogner" after some horrifically scarred villain from Wizarding lore. She had given them both weekly detentions "for the foreseeable future" and banned James from playing in the coming weekend's Quidditch game, the first of the season. So when Professor McGonagall paid Lily a visit in the hospital wing later that day, she was not sure what to expect.

She had certainly not expected to be told calmly that Bruce Morton's future at Hogwarts was currently under review with the Headmaster, or to have to strain to hear Professor McGonagall's mumbled afterthought that Lily's behavior was unacceptable and that she of course had no choice but to discipline her.

The punishment itself was as mild as the dressing-down. Though Lily would never have admitted it, she enjoyed helping score the younger students' exams, and the quiet of Professor McGonagall's office was a welcome respite from the hustle and bustle of Gryffindor Tower.

It was not quiet for long, however. Half an hour into Lily's detention, there was a rather hesitant knock at the door.

Professor McGonagall sighed, eyes still on her work, and in a breath of exasperation whispered, "Of course." Then, more loudly: "Yes, come in, Potter."

Lily looked up, heart caught in her throat. James Potter sidled into Professor McGonagall's office, a book tucked under his arm. "Hi, Professor, I—" And then he caught sight of Lily. His usual smirk or wink was replaced this evening with the look of a deer caught in headlights. Lily saw that the bruises around his eye were a deep blue now, and her stomach gave a little twinge. Why, _why_ did she find even _that_ attractive?

"Er, I wanted to ask you something, Professor." James cleared his throat. "In...in private."

Professor McGonagall raised her eyebrows. "And does this have anything to do with your Quidditch ban?"

"Well, yes—"

"Then you may assume that the answer to your question is 'no.'" Professor McGonagall turned back to her work in silence.

Lily looked up at James again, but his eyes were fixed on Professor McGonagall. Though he had been clearly dismissed, he appeared to have no intention of leaving her office. Lily could not imagine where he planned to go from there; Professor McGonagall's "no" was as final as they came.

"Professor," said James, evenly, carefully, almost timidly—timid for James Potter, anyhow—pausing just long enough to be sure that Professor McGonagall would not bite his head off before he continued. "You see, I haven't been able to find a suitable replacement yet because...well, it's a bit of an ordeal to train up a Chaser, as I'm sure you know, having been—if I may say—a cracking Chaser yourself…"

Professor McGonagall glared at him over her glasses.

James hurried on, "And I'm also Captain, of course, and...and some might argue...at the risk of sounding arrogant...one of the more...shall we say…"

"I am aware you are the most valuable player, Mr. Potter, which you ought to have considered before you engaged in that appalling display of Muggle _fisticuffs _with a _Prefect_."

James licked his split bottom lip. "I agree, Professor McGonagall, and I think I absolutely ought to be punished."

"Your agreement is irrelevant," sniped Professor McGonagall, her eyes still on her work. She dipped her quill, looked up from her papers for a moment, then continued, "Though I admit that it pleases me to see that you have at least matured into being ashamed of your behavior."

Lily snorted, feeling James' half-glance at her as she continued pretending to score exams. James seemed to take Professor McGonagall's words as a good sign, because after a moment of silence, he continued, "The trouble is...well, with only _less than two days_ now until the match...and as the Captain and most...er...one of the…"

"Mr. Potter, you have ten seconds to get to the point."

"Right. Professor McGonagall, if I'm not allowed to play, Gryffindor will lose, and you won't have punished me nearly as much as you've punished the _entire_ Gryffindor Quidditch team, and, if you really think about it, _the entirety of Gryffindor House_, who don't deserve to suffer because I'm an idiot, and...and..."—he flipped madly through the book in his hands, tearing a corner of one of the pages and sending it fluttering to the floor—"under the Department of Magical Law Enforcement's Disciplinary Rule of 1947, 'No penalty shall be inflicted upon any magical population in response to the act or acts of a single wizard or witch for which the magical population as a whole was not responsible.'" He was breathing heavily now, his finger pointed rigidly on his earmarked page of _20th Century Magical Law_. "So you see, Professor, it would be unethical, and even…" he paused as though wondering whether he should dare, then plunged ahead, "even _illegal_ to punish all of Gryffindor House for something only _I_ did, however much I myself deserve the punishment. And I'd just like to reiterate that I wholeheartedly agree that I _do_ deserve whatever _other _punishment you feel is appropriate."

Lily was not sure she had ever heard anything so loud as the silence that followed. She, James, and Professor McGonagall could have been trapped in a Muggle photograph for all their stillness if not for the light of the fire dancing on their faces, or the ticking of the clock in the corner. James looked more deerlike than ever with the firelight shining off his glasses and dancing in his wide amber eyes. Lily could almost feel how hard his heart was beating, and her own heart commiserated.

Finally, Professor McGonagall drew breath, as though to speak, when—

"PLEASE Professor, I'll do ANYTHING! _Anything!_ I'll...I'LL SNAP MY BROOM IN HALF AND LAY IT AT YOUR FEET. And not just my Comet, my LIMITED EDITION SILVER ARROW as well. I WILL TURN MY SILVER ARROW INTO KINDLING and put a kettle over it so we can arrange a DAILY DETENTION SCHEDULE over tea!"

"Potter—"

"AND I KNOW IT'S BEEN MORE THAN TEN SECONDS, AND I'M SORRY!"

"POTTER!"

"YES, PROFESSOR!"

"_Hold your tongue!_"

"OKAY."

Lily had not even noticed her hand clapping over her mouth, but there it was. She did not dare remove it, because the expression on her face would almost certainly be the last straw for Professor McGonagall.

"Mr. Potter…" She surveyed the sixth-year over her glasses for a moment. "Should the Quidditch match end at 2 o'clock on Saturday…"

James leaned forward where he stood. Lily positively goggled.

"...then I shall expect you in this office at 2:01 _sharp..._ to discuss your new punishment."

Lily looked at James, who clutched at his heart utterly without irony. "Oh, thank you, Professor. Thank you, thank you, I can't...I don't know how..."

"Yes, goodnight."

"Goodnight," said James breathlessly, sending an astonished look at Lily before he turned to leave. Then— "Professor McGonagall? Shall I…D'you want me to bring my brooms, or…?"

"Get out of my office, Potter."

"Right."

"And Potter?"

He turned back around. "Yes, Professor?"

She paused to set down her quill and rise to her feet, quite an ominous figure before the fire. "If you _dare_ to pull another stunt like this again, you will earn yourself a _permanent ban_ from the Gryffindor Quidditch team, and I shall also see to it that your resultant free evenings are spent with the other House Quidditch teams, as _ball boy_ for their training sessions."

James gulped audibly, his eyes round as bludgers. "Even Slytherin?"

Professor McGonagall leaned forward. "_Especially_ Slytherin."

James looked almost impressed that Minerva McGonagall's mind could dream up such horrors.

"Are we clear, Mr. Potter?"

"Quite clear, Professor," croaked James.

"Then you are dismissed."

After the door closed behind James and Professor McGonagall returned to her seat, Lily attempted to return to her work. But she could hardly read the words in front of her, her heart was racing so fast, twanging so wildly. Perhaps in appreciation of James' victory, or the thrill of his risk...or the way his hair sometimes fell over his glasses, which always seemed to sit a little too far down his nose, or the way his eyes shone gold in the firelight, or the untroubled way he wore his bruises, or those ridiculous suspenders he'd taken to wearing, or his unapologetically _fucking brilliant_ brazenness, or...

Lily silenced the thoughts. One thing she knew with certainty was that she'd have to force a straight expression onto her face if she had any hope of getting through the rest of her detention. She took a deep breath, poised her quill over Madeline Tosh's exam, and chanced a final glance at Professor McGonagall.

The professor seemed to sense this and looked up, directly into Lily's eyes. This was a mistake, as they were both immediately overtaken by ridiculous grins. They looked away, of course, attempting to steady themselves, but the grins stretched ever more enormously across their faces, rapidly becoming abysmal attempts to stifle laughter. Lily gave in first, and soon was carried off to hysterics at the sight of Professor McGonagall actually _giggling_. They clutched at their sides and blotted their eyes, thinking once or twice that the madness was subsiding, only to succumb again moments later. It seemed to take an eternity to gather themselves enough to take up their quills again to carry on with the night's work.

All tension, it was safe to say, had broken.


End file.
